When the Owls Cried…Age of the Fire Dragon Excerpt

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I covered my eyes with my hands, but as soon as the first tear ran down my wrist and dropped to the forest floor, I started hearing owls flying in from every direction. I rubbed away the blurriness and saw every kind of owl imaginable perched in the trees, all with their heads bowed. Then the sounds of rain filled the woods. I saw nothing but sunlight peeking through the holes in the forest’s ceiling and knew it was the owls. They were crying.

It was then that I finally understood how great Lori was. How could one obtain such love from wild animals? It was simple. She was their beloved queen. Even though people like Father Cyrus and my son, Gabby, had played with her mind to the point that she stopped visiting them, the owls, like me, never gave up on her. She was too good to give up on.

Giovalde finally showed up with Lori’s ashes. He was astonished as I, at the gathering owls who’d come to share our farewell to her. Giovalde knelt and placed her urn on the ground in front of him. I silently knelt beside him while he sang hymns and spoke the rites. To be honest, as beautiful as his words were, they didn’t comfort me. In fact, they went in one ear and out the other, as my mind was so anguished that I could feel nothing more than cold dread and grief.

I was unsure if the owls could understand a word he was saying, but I was sure their sorrow was tearing at their hearts, as mine was being torn. After a moment of silence, Giovalde stood up and pulled his sword and raised it high. He spoke a few more words and then placed his sword back into its scabbard.

“Do you have anything to add?” he asked me glumly.

“No, I think you pretty much covered it all. But I will say that I loved Lori and I will forever miss her.”

The owls hooted in unison as Giovalde lifted her urn, removed the lid and held it high while he said more graceful words. He tilted the urn downward and a small stream of ashes flew out, got caught in the wind and were scattered amongst the forest. He then tilted it more and nothing happened. Frustrated, he shook it hard until a blob of ashes fell out and exploded into the swirling wind.

Before her ashes could disappear, the owls took flight all at once and made a sphere around the blowing ashes. Giovalde and I both looked at one another in amazement; neither of us knowing what was going on. The owls hovered and started flapping their wings with fervent intensity. Lori’s ashes swirled around inside their protective sphere and eventually started massing in the center. I could see an image of a human female starting to take shape.

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Age of the Fire Dragon. Suffer the Witch Vol. 3 June 17, 2015

The final book in the Suffer the Witch Chronicles is nearly here!

June 17, 2015

Fire Dragon Gazzy Windstorm discovers that world leaders are secretly plotting to rid the world of dragons. When his friend and mentor Sir Giovalde is captured, Gazzy goes on the offensive, attacking armies and destroying all the nuclear weapons on Earth. His plans for world peace become shattered though, when a new fire dragon with a treacherous secret emerges and quickly becomes Gazzy’s most dangerous enemy.

Top Ten Witches of All Time: Honorable Mention Witches

The Witches that didn’t make it.

When I started writing this blog series, I knew I would face a dilemma. There were a lot of great witches to choose from! Not a bad dilemma. What followed was my personal top ten witches, which is certainly not official by any stretch. Here are the witches that didn’t make my list. Maybe some of them should have. Maybe there are others I didn’t even think of.

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Aislin from The Devil’s Prophet

Ok, I know I’m tooting my horn here, but I couldn’t resist. I loved writing this character. Named after a Norse goddess, Aislin is raised by a family of ages old witches whose heirloom is Dr. John Dee’s famous crystal ball. Oh, and by the way, her first cousin is the Anti-Christ. As he takes over Europe and Asia, she flees with her crystal ball to America, where she has foreseen the rise of unknowing Col. Robert Franklin, the one man who can stop the Anti-Christ. Problem is he just wants to find his missing children and he knows she knows the secret to their whereabouts.

Bette Midler in Hocus Pocus

With perhaps the worst makeup job in movie history, Bette played the part perfectly and pulled a horrid storyline out of the…

Blair Witch

Freaky story if there ever was one! This movie crept me out the first time I watched it. Not because I believed it was real, but because of the way it was filmed. A lot of movies are made this way now.

Jeanne Dixon

She was so famous she was called to a meeting with President Franklin D. Roosevelt to do a private reading. She revealed to him he was going to die, and die he did a short time later. She also is credited with predicting JFK’s assassination. She is remembered as America’s Prophet.

Joan of Arc

Ok, I know, she was technically a saint, not a witch. That being said, she is the only women on this list, or the top ten for that matter, who was actually burned at the stake for being a witch. The damning evidence: She claimed direct communication with God. Sadly, that claim has gotten more than a few people martyred. Her real sin: Challenging the male authority. That has also gotten more than few people killed.

Melissa Joan Heart in Sabrina the Teenage Witch.

A teen sitcom, my kids loved to watch it. It had some cool elements like a talking cat named Salem and awkward romance drama that teenagers easily relate to. Sabrina is kind of like their Samantha from Bewitched.

Olympias, mother of Alexander the Great

What a great story here, right? She weaved her wicked web on the king of Phillip, King of Macedonia and produced an heir that would conquer the world and leave his mark throughout history, even  to this day. A devout member of the snake-worshiping cult of Dionysus, she dreamt of a lightning bolt striking her stomach and exploding the night Alexander was conceived. She later told Alexander that his father was really Zeus and had him schooled by Aristotle. He became an unstoppable military leader the likes of which the world had never seen...and has not seen since.

Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman as the Owens sisters in Practical Magic.

A great story of two sisters fighting of a curse that haunts their witchy family. All the women in family who use witchcraft lose their husbands to untimely deaths. So, as the story goes, they try not to be witches! Hilarious!

Selena Gomez in The Wizards of Waverly Place.

Get the same kind of feeling from Selena’s character of Alex as I do with Sabrina, but my kids like it so I have to throw it in here. J I have to give Selena credit though; she is very talented and will have a long, enchanted career. Now, if she could just make Justin Bieber disappear...

Sybil Leek

Another of my favorites that just missed the cut, Sybil was as famous in her day as any woman alive. She came to prominence in her native Britain after ages old anti-witchcraft laws were repealed.  Coming from a long pedigree of witchcraft, she sort of inspired my character, Aislin. She became a media darling when she moved to the USA, appearing in newspapers, magazines and television. She was admittedly related to the evil Aleister Crowley.

The Witch from Hansel and Gretel

What is not to like about a witch that lives in a house made of cake and candy? The fact that she likes the flesh of children more than cake and candy for one! Unfortunately for this witch of lore, she was easily outsmarted by young Hansel and Gretal, who promptly made witch roast of her.

The Witch from Sleeping Beauty

Maleficent is this witch’s name and she is outraged the king didn’t invite her to bless his daughter, the princess Aurora. Out of spite, she curses the baby to die on her sixteenth birthday. Rival good witches hide her with a peasant couple. They also soften the curse so that instead of dying she is doomed to fall into a deep sleep until her true love kisses her. Problem is her true love thinks she is a peasant girl. True love wins in this one though and the evil witch gets turned to ash. Look for Maleficent to get her own live action movie this summer, played by the lovely, Angelina Jolie, who ironically, also played Alexander the Great's mother on the silver screen.

The Witch from Snow White

It was difficult keeping this witch, simply known as the Queen, out of the top ten. She has everything you would want in a witch. Beautiful, smart, spiteful, jealous, rich, powerful, owns a talking magick mirror and uses poisonous apples. The only reason I kept her out was because she was so similar to the witch from Sleeping Beauty.

The Witch from Rosemary’s Baby

Minnie Castevet, played by actress Ruth Gordon, was the witch that tricked Rosemary into wearing a dreadful tanis root charm that makes her unable to stand food and eating poison chocolate mousse so Satan can rape her in a black mass ritual. She conceives a son, Adrian. Poor Rosemary, played by Mia Farrow, finally discovers the witches ruse and tries to escape, only to fall right back into their trap. Great movie, creepy as Hell, with one of the dizziest witches ever, but boy was she clever!

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No. 7 Witch of All-Time: Hermione Granger as portrayed by Emma Watson (Harry Potter)

Top Ten Female Witches of All-time (real or imagined)

What fantasy author can resist a witch that loves the library? Certainly not this one! For that reason, and many more actually, Hermione Granger, Harry Potter’s female sidekick, comes into my list of the Top Ten Witches of All-Time at number seven.

The character of Hermione, portrayed in the Harry Potter movie series by the lovely Emma Watson, is more than just a sidekick. Her magick is as powerful as any witch on this list, and without her unique and well studied magickal talents, Harry Potter would have been up the proverbial crap creek without a paddle on more than one occasion.

In a world where female protagonists with super powers are much more common than yesteryear, I certainly like Hermione better than Bella on Twilight. My daughter might feel differently, but Hermione always had a purpose and that purpose usually had more to do with righting wrongs than falling in love. There, I said it…whew!

Another thing that impresses me about Hermione is that she doesn’t have to be perfect. She has doubts, fears and questions everything, but when push comes to shove, she isn’t afraid to shove.

As I researched this character I learned that she has a lot in common with her author and creator, JK Rowling. It’s nothing unusual for an author to put tidbits of themselves into their works, but if JK is anything like Hermione in real life, then she must be as good a person as she is an author.

As the series grows, so does the character of Hermione. Nothing more than a child in the first Potter books, she is a fully grown young woman by the time it all ends. I always kind of wished she and Harry Potter would fall in love, but Rowling chose the third protagonist from the series, the ever loyal Ron Weasly to be her love interest. Through all the bickering they slung at each other, a strange chemistry developed between the two and by the epilogue of the final book, they were married and had children. Perfect fairytale ending, right?

Beyond her magickal abilities, I think the things that make Hermione so charming are her intellect and her loyalty. Never one to back down from a challenge, her response to the antagonists in the series, such as the ever frowning Malfoy, was to get revenge by outsmarting the bad guys. And she did quite a good job of that!

Though some might have seen Hermione as standoffish, I felt relatively the opposite. Being a book worm and someone who did outstandingly well in class, I can relate to her character, even though she is meant to be a geeky female heroine. There is far more to Hermione than that. Seemingly always the first to master new lessons and spells, who else would Harry Potter call upon when he was in a bind against the formidable antagonists he had to face? I am sure Harry would have Hermione a bit higher on the list, but I think she is perfect here at number four. Do you agree?

What this says for the final four witches on my list is that they are amazing! I can’t wait to reveal them to you! Stay tuned!!!

Thanks for reading my blog. Please follow me, share and tell an enemy and a friend. I look forward to seeing you next time. I also encourage you to visit my author website to check out my novels and short stories. My psycho-sexual/dark fantasy novel about dragons, undead knights, and you guessed it, witches is called Rise of the Raven Knights, Suffer the Witch Volume I and it can be found at http://sufferthewitch.com.

My apocalyptic sci-fi thriller, The Devil’s Prophet is also available at http://thedevilsprophet.com.

Number 5 Witch of All-Time: Bewitched Samantha Stephens (Elizabeth Montgomery)

Number 6 Witch of All-Time: Bewitched Samantha Stephens (Elizabeth Montgomery)

Elizabeth Montgomery portrayal of Samantha brought witchcraft properly into the nineteen-sixties with a twinkle of her nose, forever changing primetime television and becoming the most mainstream witch in history. The contemporary sitcom, Bewitched, was her vehicle, and the blonde bombshell with girl next door innocence came complete with a bumbling husband who despised her religion, but reaped the rewards anyways, a beautiful daughter, a meddling mother and her husband’s buffoon of a boss. That sits Elizabeth’s character, Samantha, and her little nose trick, which I still haven’t figured out, squarely in the top ten female witches of all-time, at number six.

While the show shared a lot in common with another sitcom, I Dream of Jeannie, what set this show apart was Samantha’s devotion. She was a devoted wife, mother and daughter and even though her husband forbade her from using her formidable witchcraft skills, she still found a way to help him out of personal crisis after personal crisis, with a twitch of her magickal nose.

While Barbara Eden’s Jeannie character was drop dead sexy, (sans the belly button), Samantha did all her magick with a sleek, but chic fashion. Even without the magick, she would have been the perfect wife. She cooked, cleaned, took care of the family and her man, but when you added her magick, she was more than a handful.

Born from a long line of witches, who could appear and disappear at will, and even travel time, Sam’s mother did everything in her power to keep the family tradition alive, despite husband Darrin’s (originally Dick York, later Dick Sargent) protests. Often the catalyst to the shows appeal, the friction between Sam, her husband and her mother was hilarious. Even though fictitious, the show’s appeal lay squarely on Elizabeth Montgomery’s realistic portrayal of Samantha. It was kind of like Lucille Ball meets Glinda the Good Witch of the East, set in modern times, of course, at least at the time of its production. The show was simply beloved by millions, men, women and children alike.

Now, I must give the creators and writers credit as well. The brain trust of this series knew that in order to reach mainstream America with a witch story, they had to make her appealing and tasteful. If I possessed the kind of powerful magick that could make anything appear from out of nowhere, I would certainly be courting the kind of wealth of the likes of Bill Gates and the children of Sam Walton (Walmart). I would be a philanthropist, a world traveler, a playboy along the lines of Bruce Wayne. But Samantha never aspired to those heights. She kept it simple, and kept her powers in check, only using them when she felt necessary. Perhaps that was the most impressive thing about Samantha. She put her family and their hopes for the 1960’s style American Dream first. Kudos, Samantha Stephens!

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Number 8 Witch of All-time: Glinda, the Good Witch

Top Ten Female Witches of All-time (real or imagined)

Number 7: Glinda, the Good Witch of the East

To my recollection, Glinda, the Good Witch of the East, was the first witch shown in a positive light in mainstream culture. I have to give kudos to author of the Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum, for being creative and forward thinking enough to go against the norm, in a time where religion would be very apt to not accept such a character. Glinda broke all the stereotypes previously associated with witches: she was beautiful, kind, delightful; everything her nemesis, the Wicked Witch of the West was not. For that reason, Glinda, the Good Witch of the East comes onto my list of the top ten female witches of all-time, real or imagined, at number seven!

Glinda is now a huge part of Americana. Who could ever think of the classic movie, The Wizard of Oz, without thinking of the glittery, blonde haired, golden voiced good witch, played by actress Billie Burke in the famous 1939 version and by Michelle Williams in 2013’s Oz, the Great and Powerful. Sure, characters such as Dorothy, Toto, the Straw Man, The Tin Man, the Heartless Lion, the Great Oz and the aforementioned Wicked Witch of the West get more credit, but Glinda was a trailblazer, at least as far as practitioners of white magick go.

            

The acceptance of witchcraft has came a long way since the burning times of the Catholic Church in Medieval Europe and beyond, even to the shores of America, with the shameful witch hunts of Salem, Massachusetts. And even though things have changed for the better, there is still a stigma associated with practicing this oldest and perhaps wisest of religions. There is still much room for improvement in this area. Sure, today’s witches don’t carry shimmering magick wands with stars on top, except perhaps wee little girls on Halloween, but most people that practice the craft today do so to seek enlightenment and personal growth, not to eat babies or kill a neighboring farmer’s crops or prize milk cow.

It seems to me that all religions are intolerant of other religions to some degree, but this is especially true with Wicca. The famous line in the Bible, “Though shalt not suffer a witch to live”, still resonates throughout the world to this very day. Even though choosing to take to heart certain directives in the Bible and other religious texts, while ignoring others, could certainly be construed as cherry picking, I think it is much more important to believe that whatever god or goddess we worship would want us to finally live in peace and shared respect and love. Hopefully, someday the practice of Wicca will become more accepted, especially considering that most witches today are more in line with the practices of Glinda, the Good Witch, rather than any wicked witch!

            

And besides, who else could possibly take an innocent girl like Dorothy, tell her a magick spell many decades ago, and expect to have it still repeated to this day? Click your heels three times and say, “There’s no place like home”. Can you remember a better line?

Check back Thursday for the Number 8 Witch of All-time!

Thanks for reading my blog. Please follow me, share and tell an enemy and a friend. I look forward to seeing you next time. I also encourage you to visit my author website to check out my novels and short stories. My psycho-sexual/dark fantasy novel about dragons, undead knights, and you guessed it, witches is called Rise of the Raven Knights, Suffer the Witch Volume I and it can be found at http://sufferthewitch.com.

My Apocalyptic Dark Fiction Thriller THE DEVIL'S PROPHET is available @ http://thedevilsprophet.com

Number 9 Witch of All-Time: The Charmed Ones

Top Ten Female Witches of All-time (real or imagined)

Number 9: The Charmed Ones

Never mind the fluff, who can resist these heavily bosomed babes, who could rank in the top ten of many other lists, including the most beautiful witches? Yes, the Halliwell sisters, aka the Charmed Ones come into my list at number nine!

Wielding extremely powerful magick, which would rival even the great wunderkind with the lightning bolt on his forehead, these ladies saved the world every week for several years from a bevy of the underworld’s most fearsome demons. And they did so with style and a sexiness not often afforded characters that have throughout history have been portrayed as ugly, wart faced freaks. Kudos to this bevy of wizardly young ladies who could charm the socks off me any time they wished!

Of the four young actresses who played the Charmed Ones, my favorite is Alyssa Milano, who played Phoebe.  I am not ashamed to admit that I’ve had a crush on her since she played on the series, Who’s the Boss? She is also an actress not afraid to take chances, a trait I can certainly relate to, and proven by her in the role she took in the vampire film, Embrace of the Vampire. This film, while probably not garnering her much critical acclaim, certainly boasts of some of the steamiest scenes ever put on celluloid, not related to porn.

Much maligned actress, Shannon Doherty, appeared as Prue, the leader of the Charmed sisters in its first years of production, but for whatever reason, the actress with the personality of Guns and Roses’ singer, Axl Rose, was replaced by actress Rose McGowan, who played long lost sister, Paige.  Rose fit well with the group. Though not as edgy as Shannon, her innocent demeanor probably won her many new fans, especially those could never really trust the former 90210 star she replaced.

The most level headed of the sisters, Piper, was played by Holly Marie Combs. Her warnings usually went unheeded, until crisis presented itself and she had to bail her naïve, love struck sisters out of the jams they inevitably found themselves in.  Falling in love with an angelic being and having a child with him, certainly gave her character a stability that the other girls lacked, as they often had new boyfriends every week.

Like I mentioned earlier, this television series was loaded with much more fluff than substance. However, when the sisters needed to get down and dirty with some impressive magick, they always returned to their Book of Shadows. Though their powers were certainly overstated and beyond belief, the fact that they placed their Book of Shadows at the forefront of their magickal knowledge, gave Charmed that one element of believability that would otherwise be lacking.

Immortalized by the great television lexicon of syndication, these ladies will be thrilling audiences and charming young people into exploring the world of magick for years to come. Inspiration sometimes comes from the most unlikely of sources, and at some point in the future, some imaginative mind will use this series to come up with a fantastic story in a new fictionalized world, once again proving that magick will never die.

Thanks for reading my blog. Please follow me, share and tell an enemy and a friend. I look forward to seeing you next time. I also encourage you to visit my author website to check out my novels and short stories. My psycho-sexual/dark fantasy novel about dragons, undead knights, and you guessed it, witches is called Rise of the Raven Knights, Suffer the Witch Volume I and it can be found at http://sufferthewitch.com.

My Apocalyptic Dark Fiction Thriller THE DEVIL'S PROPHET is available @ http://thedevilsprophet.com

Number 10 Witch of All Time: Silver Ravenwolf

 Ranking and researching my top ten female witches of all time has been a real labor of love. Not all of my stories involve witches or witchcraft, but when my art does take me in that direction, I want to make sure I am well versed. The same is true with this blog. I can’t guarantee everything I write will be absolutely the gospel truth, but rest assured everything I write will be well researched. If I make a mistake and you happen to catch it, feel free to reply and politely set the matter straight. I will acknowledge my mistake, and you, of course, for being attentive, and all will be right! 

Though she didn't make the Top Ten, there was no way I could do this series without spotlighting Mr. Silver Ravenwolf. 

Silver is a well respected, though somewhat controversial figure in the world of Wicca, which for those of you who do not know, is the official name for the religion of Witchcraft. She has published several ‘how-to’ books on witchcraft, some of which I have personally read. Though not the first person to write and publish self instruction books for performing ancient wisdom, nor the highest authority, Silver does know of what she instructs. To me, she took a lot of the stigma of Wicca away and made it acceptable, as well as accessible. For that reason alone, she should be given credit. 

Whether or not ‘magick spells’ work or not, I will not get into today. My feelings are that if any type of spirituality makes you feel positive about yourself and your fellow woman or man, and is peaceful, then it is alright in my book. Silver’s teachings of the ‘craft’ certainly fit that scenario. 

Wicca might never be widely accepted by mainstream America, or the major religions that dominate worship throughout the world, but I am certainly thankful that the days of punishing people for being a witch are over. Nothing I have read in Silver’s work would deem someone worthy of being burned at the stake for reading or practicing it, as in ancient times, nor vilified and shunned, as often is the case in the modern world. 

Silver has garnered her share of controversy though, because of both her high profile and for speaking out. Those in other more ‘more acceptable’ religions believe she leads young, impressionable adults into the darkest of crafts, setting their souls up for an eternity of hellish punishment from their god. Some in Wicca believe her teachings often stray from the traditional and are too simplistic. Despite this, Silver keeps rolling along, writing her books and living her life the way she chooses. For this reason alone, I had to include her in my list! 

After all, we do live in a country that gives us Constitutional freedom to worship whatever religion we choose. Without Silver and other brave trailblazers like her, mainstream acceptance of magickal stories might never have happened. Thanks for all you have done, Silver!

Thanks for reading my blog. Please follow me, share and tell an enemy and a friend. I look forward to seeing you next time. I also encourage you to visit my author website to check out my novels and short stories. My psycho-sexual/dark fantasy novel about dragons, undead knights, and you guessed it, witches is called Rise of the Raven Knights, Suffer the Witch Volume I and it can be found at http://sufferthewitch.com.

My Apocalyptic Dark Fiction Thriller, THE DEVIL'S PROPHET is available @ http://thedevilsprophet.com